Scared
by Spooky Dingo
Summary: Danny is scared. [Slight AU, two days after Danny's accident.]


**This is probably one of the sweetest fanfictions I've ever written. It takes place two days after Danny's lab accident, as you can likely figure out, and while it's different from canon I wouldn't go so far as to say it's AU because it's not all that different except...yeah.**

**Yes, this might be my first Danny Phantom fanfiction, but I'm not going to about with the whole, "This is my first Danny Phantom story so don't flame me," thing. This is my story. Read it, love it, hate it, whatever. ;)**

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It wasn't exactly his fault he'd gotten into a lab accident...Well, okay, it was, only because it wouldn't be fair to peg the blame on Sam or Tucker (most Sam) ...but he had to admit it wasn't all him. With that out of his mind, he took a deep breath and thought about what they'd discovered when he stumbled out of the portal two days prior.

White hair. Glowing green eyes. Inverted jumpsuit. Floating. Glowing.

Ghost.

Danny had somehow turned back into a human, and the trio figured, maybe that was the extent of the damage. Temporarily making him look like a ghost seemed like a plausible solution, right? A mild side effect? So they let it go until the next day, until Danny began falling through things and tripping too often. Maybe he was just tired or confused from the accident, they said. No, Danny said, he felt fine.

And that was when all three of them caught sight of his left hand. It was blue, transparent, and nothing could touch it.

Intangible. Ghost.

They'd tried to figure it out. Tucker looked up information on his PDA while Sam borrowed his computer. Meanwhile Danny had been trying to get his hand back to normal with no luck. Sam couldn't find anything. Even Tucker, techno genius, couldn't. So they just accepted the fact that, yes, Danny had some ghostly side effects. Maybe they'd wear off, they said, and Danny had known what they were thinking of even though they didn't voice it.

The accident. What he looked like. Ghost. That was a side effect too, right?

And so, Danny stood in his room, the door shut and curtains drawn, as he prepared to find out if the whole ghost thing really was a side effect or not. He had a sneaking suspicion, and he wasn't quite sure he wanted to test it out, but he knew he had to. Danny could feel a cold sensation tingling at the center of his chest, and he knew that ghosts were supposed to be cold. So he concentrated on that cold feeling, bringing it up to the surface, and before he knew it, there was a flash.

He was no longer himself. Or maybe this WAS him now. He could feel that he was wearing a hazmat suit, that much was clear. It didn't feel like he was wearing jeans and a t-shirt anymore. Jus tot be sure, Danny sucked in a shuddering breath- did he even have to?- and closed his eyes before pulling a bit of his hair down in front of his eyes.

He knew what he would see there. White hair. But it still startled him, and he yelped despite himself, jumping backward in surprise and landing on his bed for only a moment before he bounced off and stayed there. In the air. Gasping, Danny panicked and wheeled his arms and legs around frantically as he attempted to figure out just how to get down. And then he fell. Maybe it was because he was panicking; Danny didn't know. All he knew was that all that movement had pushed him away from his bed, and he fell to the floor with a light thud and an ,"Oomph!". Thank goodness he didn't turn intangible, as he thought he might.

"Danny, are you okay in there?" his mother's voice suddenly called out. What was she doing upstairs?! She was supposed to be down in the lab! After all, the portal had just begun to work and they wanted to study it, right?

"F-f-f-f-f-fine!" Danny stuttered, wincing both at how his voice echoed and how much he stumbled over the word, indicating he was most definitely not alright.

"Oooookaaaaay, but I'm coming to check on you, alright sweetie?" his mom said, stretching out 'okay' in a manner that suggested she was suspicious. Light footsteps approached. The doorknob began to turn. In the split second he had left before the door pushed open, Danny scrambled to the door and kept it shut, pushing with all his strength. "Danny!" his mother harrumphed. "You open the door this instant, young man!"

"I-I-I can't!" Danny pleaded, not having time to think up an excuse. He desperately hoped his mother didn't notice the echoing tone to his voice, but then again, she was his mother! How could she not?

"Danny," Maddie's voice changed to one of sympathy. "I'm your mother. I love you, and I care about you very much. If there's something wrong, I want to know what so I can help you, sweetie." Of course Danny felt bad now. It was impossible not to. He'd always been closer to his mother than his father, and now, he was hiding himself from her because he was a ghost and she was a ghost hunter. It hurt him. It hurt his heart, if he ever had one now.

With that feeling still aching through him, he promptly fell straight through the door and ended up flat on his back, his legs sticking through his door as he looked up at his mother's shocked- but slightly more confused- face. No rage. No anger. No ghost weapons pulled on him. "...Danny?" she said softly after a moment of examining him.

Ever so slowly, Danny sat up and turned around, leaning back on his door. He looked up to Maddie with fear filled green eyes and murmured, "Please don't hurt me," as he looked down again, apparently very interested in his white gloved hands. Maddie knelt down and slowly enveloped him in a hug, surprising him for a moment before he returned the hug, digging his fingers into her own hazmat suit and biting back a sob. "Mom," he choked out a moment after the emotion hit, "I'm scared."

"I know sweetie, I know, but you need to tell me what happened to you," Maddie said gently, not breaking the hug. She didn't seem fazed by how cold he was at all, but maybe that was the hazmat suit. Danny didn't know.

"The portal," Danny started, shuddering at the memory. In response Maddie gently stroked his hair to calm him down, and he summoned up the strength to keep talking. "I...I didn't like how sad you were. So I tried to fix it...A-and...there was a button on the inside that I accidentally pushed..." Maddie gasped at this. Of course Jack had put the 'ON' button inside the portal.

"Oh Danny, I'm so sorry...this is all my fault..." she whispered, horrified that one of her inventions had done this to her child, when he was only trying to help. But Danny knew it wasn't her fault, oh no. So he kept talking.

"It's not...it's mine for going in there, Mom, it's all my fault. I came out of the portal and Sam and Tucker f-found me l-like this..." Danny half shrugged his shoulders to explain what he was attempting to say, "And we were so scared that I had...had...d-d-died," he mumbled, still frightened. His mother took a breath as if about to say something, but Danny plunged on. "And somehow, I don't know how, I...went back to normal."

"So..." Maddie began, but Danny wasn't done. After a shuddering breath that he still wasn't sure if he needed or not, he kept speaking, albeit now even quieter than before.

"I wanted to find out if I really was a...g-g-ghost..." he said slowly, and pulled away from his mother so as to properly look her in the eyes. Wrapping his arms around himself, he murmured, "I'm scared, Mom...really scared. What am I?" he pleaded, almost begging to hear some confirmation that he wasn't a ghost. "I glow, I float, I phase through stuff...my voice echoes..." he half-sobbed when his mom didn't reply right away, a tear tracing its way down his cheek.

"I know what you are." Maddie replied, soft but firmly. "You're my son. Look." she said while placing her left hand on his shoulder, and with the tip of her right index finger she swept the tear off his face. "Ghosts can't cry. Ghosts can't feel pain." She pinched him. "Ghosts don't have emotion."

"But..." Danny started, but was interrupted by two white rings of light. Maddie blinked and squinted through the light, trying to see what was happening, and Danny yelped. However, a moment later he gasped. White shirt. Blue jeans. Red shoes.

Black hair. Blue eyes.

Human.


End file.
